Night on the Ark
by The Fish with no pen
Summary: The Tactician isn't completely sparkless and sometimes even he needs to just think and angst when no one is watching. Even if the angst was unintentionally caused when he was just avoiding something else.


_**DISCLAIMER:**_ No own no suing. Hasbro would probably hunt me down if I tried to say I own this franchise.

_**NOTES:**_ I have nothing to blame on this but random thoughts and trying to make a kids show a bit more serious and adult like for some reason. Don't kill me too bad.

* * *

Most nights on the Ark were quiet as many were in their recharge cycles, or on the few night shifts still needed to run and defend the Ark. Allowing one to roam almost freely and not have to worry about being bothered. It gave one time to think, especially when said mech roaming was the SIC Prowl and his thoughts were on the black and white saboteur he for some reason called friend.

Prowl was fond of Jazz in his own way. The saboteur having befriended him when most just saw him as the sparkless tactician who was only good for his battle computer. In his cpu Prowl understood this and did nothing to change that bit of gossip and never let it get to his emotional chips, which he did have but kept them muted for his own sanity, because he did not need anything outside of the friendship he had with Jazz. The TIC who lived life seemingly only through his emotional chips if one didn't know better, and had no qualms in making Prowl live such as well. Even if only through the visor mech's stories and reports. It was an odd sort of friendship to most who noticed it, but it was how the two mechs with almost inverted color schemes of the other fared.

Though their complete opposites in practically everything did cause friction from time to time that couldn't be solved through words or a simple glare; especially now in the sometimes almost claustrophobic conditions that they and the entire crew of the Ark had found themselves in. So many rioting personalities and various levels of egos confined to live in one ship and limited places for the crew to scatter and be truly alone, it was amazing how energon had not coated the walls and floors in thick layers yet from them all finally snapping to a breaking point. Not that Prowl was truly contemplating such, even as he managed to make fleeing his office look like a purposeful stride. His logic processors and battle computer still whining at him for the near lock up he just avoided when dealing with Jazz in one of the two phases Prowl normally noted and thus avoided the saboteur when he was in one of such moods. Those being the pinning for some mech or femme that had caught Jazz's eye and spark or when the TIC finally broke down behind the music and optimistic attitude.

It wasn't so much out of a selfishness or uncaring that Prowl avoided the other for the latter phase. No it was just an ingrained reaction after countless vorns of being there and knowing when it was and was not a good idea to be in Jazz's company. That certain black and white colored mech did not like others to see his breakdowns until the worse of the normally controlled temper was under control again. Prowl still felt phantom twinges in his doorwings from the one time he had stayed during the first stages of Jazz breaking down. Everyone always seemed to forget that to get into an officer position and be in charge of special operations one had to be ruthless in a variety of ways, and be good at hiding said ruthlessness when around the grunts who used the officers as a touchstone in much the same way they used Prime as their symbol for why they fight.

This time luckily however, as the Ark didn't have a place outside of the brig that Jazz could hide in to break down and not be known as doing so by all and sundry, Prowl was fleeing for the other reason. Jazz had set his spark for someone and was thus pinning in the only place no one would see him pine on the Ark. Thus making Prowl's office unusable for the time being if he did not want to lock up and end up onlining in the med bay once again. Jazz seemed to fall for the most illogical of mechs and for the oddest of reasons that his processor ached just imagining the conversation that tended to lead up to the designation of the current object of affection being mentioned.

"Prowl!?"

He had been closer to a lock up then he had originally diagnosed if he had not noticed how painfully close he had come to running right into Red Alert. A situation that would not have bode well for either of them as Red Alert's sensory net was far more trouble then it was worth on some occasions if you incited the jumpy mech's glitch at the same time. Prowl did not want to once again explain to all why touching, especially touching without permission and passing the pressure of a slight breeze, was a bad idea when he reported his involvement in the crashed Security Director's new stay in the med bay. That much processed information to an already overly stressed cpu was distressing enough without adding a crew that did not seem to get how much of the cpu housed in that red and white mech was constantly running most of the programs not hardwired into Teletraan-1.

"My apologies Red Alert, I was a bit too deep in a data string."

"Jazz is pinning again isn't he?"

And Prowl was truly over balanced by Jazz to forget that anything that so much as twitched on the Ark, Red Alert knew about it. Being constantly connected to every camera and listening device made it impossible and probably have sent lesser mechs into some Cybertronian form of insanity long ago. Or at least made it noticeable that he could order the other officer to see Smokescreen and perhaps finally get some of that hardware out of the other and into Teletraan-1. Doubtful though as it was harder to hack into it this way, when it was constantly mobile and didn't need more then a tentative uplink to mesh with the rest of the ship and saving their sparks that much longer in all respects. Best to stop that thinking if he truly did not want a lock up by bringing his moral programming to wage war on his battle computer.

"Yes."

A soft hum almost smug and a wide optic look that caused Prowl to internally scramble to keep his guilt at bay, even as the cold logic whispered that Red Alert had been of age (Barely! He was still getting used to his adult protoform, his moral programming yelled) when he joined and agreed to the modifications to become Security Director. It was a necessary move that had opened up the board to new possibilities that did not run into numbers of bleakness. When the war was over maybe, if there was anything left of the shy yet determined mech that had been introduced to them. The autobot insignia barely a breem old on a white chassis as they sentenced him to either an early deactivation or an unstable cpu that could never run normally again.

"Twins near the blast room, and Jazz just left your office to look for you. I need to get back to the security room, it could be in shambles since I last left it. Never know when we'll get ambushed by Decepticons they're always waiting for an opening."

It wasn't worth it sometimes to think too deeply on how true that might be, despite how most of the Ark laughed it off as typical Red Alert paranoia, and not see the constant firewall building that was likely taking place in nervous fear that one day Soundwave would figure out how they could never truly hack their system, and turn his odd abilities on their Security Director. Not tonight though, everything was normal and right in the Ark. Jazz would talk his audio off about everything and nothing once he found him, and he would soon have to send the twins to the brig again for some inane reason.

For now it was quiet as most of those on the Ark were in their recharge cycle or on the few night shifts still needed to run and defend the Ark. Leaving it in a state where one could freely roam and think without being bothered. Especially when thoughts found a way from those of light exasperation to guilt filled ones that seem to creep up when the war seemed so far away.


End file.
